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Xps 1645 no boot (no fan) after thermal paste and dust off

Tags:
  • Thermal paste
  • Dell Studio Xps
  • Boot up issue
  • CPUs
Last response: in CPUs
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March 8, 2014 6:06:10 PM

After a big video project recently, my 4 year old xps started to lock up to a black screen when rendering video using Camtasia or logging on to 3d Virtual environments.
All i coyld was to a hard restart. At times I got windows repair, at times just "start windows normally".

I did a back up + clean window 7 install + update to Sp1 and the laptop worked fine on basic work like emails, office stuff, youtube. However it still locked up on 3d and video. I downloaded gpu-z and Cpu-Id to monitor cpu and gpu temperatures and saw that gpu load was reaching the 99% quickly and averaging 80-85° . It locked up during a Dell diag rendering 3D as well as with Furmark to stress the limits of my ATI 4670 HD.

Reading through many a forum, I thought I might try to clean up my fan and re-apply thermal paste to the CPU and GPU. I disassembled vacuumed, dusted off with spray air, then delicately reassembled the whole lot, plugged in fan, plugged HD back and Ram. I am now stuck to no boot and audio lights mute, and blinking volume. No beep nor Dell splash screen.
(Note: I didn't touch the mother board)

I also thought I had applied too much paste, so opened again, cleaned up again CPU and GPU and reassembled)
I also removed the battery and PSU pressed "on" button for 30sec put battery back, Psu, to no avail.

Thank you fou your help!!!

Xps studio 1645, i7 (can't remember model), 500gb sata, 8gb ram, ati mobility radeon 4670 hd

More about : xps 1645 boot fan thermal paste dust

March 17, 2014 10:19:32 AM

Conductive paste was fine as long as applied as super thin layer so as not to damage the components around the plate. I disassembled the whole lot again (RAM, HD and heatsink) and was very careful to reconnect everything properly... I believe it was the RAM I had misplaced 3times... Non POST symptoms are generally related to bad connections to the motherboard. It is purring like a kitten in warm blanket now. I have done a 3d test which was the issue for overheating and it works like a charm! Thanks again!

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